Government Flees Paris

After the departure of M. Thiers, General Leflo, Minister of War, insisted on the necessity of complete evacuation.

Continuing The 1871 Paris Commune,
our selection from Histoire de la France contemporaine by Gabriel Hanotaux published in 1903. The selection is presented in six easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in The 1871 Paris Commune.

Time: 1871
Place: Paris

The old Marquis de Vogué was among the chance comers. He pulled out of his pocket his deputy’s scarf of 1848, and he went from one to the other, bent, his voice broken, saying: “I know how it is done. You put that round your body, and you get yourself killed on a barricade.”

General Leflo, Minister of War, who had gone as far as the Place de la Bastille to get information, returned between twelve and one o’clock.

It was decided to order the general call to arms to be beaten, to assemble the battalions of the National Guard, which, it was thought, could be relied on. Only six hundred men presented themselves.

M. Thiers, in a state of great emotion, wished to learn from General Vinoy what was the exact military situation.

Already by midday or one o’clock he was beginning to declare that it would be necessary to resolve to abandon Paris. In his impatience he went as far as the Pont de la Concorde to meet the troops, who were retreating in good order with General Faron at their head. Toward three o’clock he returned to the Quai d’Orsay.

The news in Paris was worse and worse. The barracks were taken or evacuated. However, the Hotel de Ville, relying on the troops of the Lobau barracks and occupied by Jules Ferry, who refused to abandon it at any price, still held out.

M. Thiers had hardly returned to the palace of the Quai d’Orsay when drums and clarions were heard, and from the windows three battalions were seen passing; they were the National Guards of the Gros-Caillou, who were going to join the movement. In the palace there was only half a battalion of light infantry. In spite of the wavering of Jules Favre, Jules Simon, and Ernest Picard, “whom it was difficult to convince of the necessity for this retreat,” the Government knew the chief of the executive power could not remain thus exposed. For the rest M. Thiers cut the question short. He decided that he should leave Paris and betake himself to Versailles. It was half-past three or four o’clock. “Foreseeing that,” says General Vinoy, “I had doubled my escort. I had had my carriage prepared, and all was ready. I said to M. Thiers: ‘Put on your overcoat; the gate of the Bois de Boulogne is guarded; your escape through it is assured.’ I had sent a squadron there. But before starting he gave me the order to evacuate Paris.” M. Thiers, in fact, calling up, as he has himself said, recollections of February 24, 1848, and of Marshal Windischgraetz, who after leaving Vienna reentered victoriously some time afterward, was strengthened in his opinion by the state of disorganization and demoralization in which he felt the army to be.

He was insistent with General Vinoy to learn what troops there were that could be counted on. The General told him there was not one sure except the Daudel brigade. M. Thiers repeated again and again: “Send me the Daudel brigade to Versailles.” There was no written order.

After the departure of M. Thiers, General Leflo, Minister of War, insisted on the necessity of complete evacuation. He affirmed that it would be impossible to hold out anywhere, even at the Trocadéro or at Passy. He signed the order and accepted all the responsibility.

Now, the Daudel brigade occupied the forts, including Mont Valérien. Chance willed it that the two battalions of light infantry, which it was proposed to withdraw from Paris, were on duty at this fort; this for a whole day was the entire garrison.

In the night between the Sunday and Monday General Vinoy, toward one in the morning, wrote a letter to M. Thiers, which Mme. Thiers read to him without his getting up, and in which he begged for authority to have Mont Valérien reoccupied. M. Thiers ended by consenting. Otherwise this fort, like those of Issy, Vanves, and Vincennes, would have been in the hands of the Commune. Mont Valérien was reoccupied on March 20th in the morning; the Fédérates presented themselves there hours afterward and in vain summoned the commander to surrender.

Meanwhile in Paris the Central Committee, taken at first by surprise, ordered the beat to arms. Montmartre, Belleville, the Buttes Chaumont, were in full insurrection. The Panthéon, Vaugirard, the Gobelins, rose to the voice of Duval. The battalions of the middle-class quarters did not respond to the call. At Montmartre a tragic scene settled the implacable character of the outbreak. General Lecomte, who had been arrested in the morning, was kept under surveillance in the house No. 6 of the Rue des Roziers. Clément Thomas, a former General of the National Guard, who had very imprudently mixed with the crowd in civil attire, was arrested and shut up with him. After some hours of frightful anguish Clément Thomas was seized and shot at close quarters just as he was going down the staircase; General Lecomte was shot in his turn in the garden, and, it is said, by his own soldiers.

In the evening M. Jules Favre hurled at a deputation, consisting of MM. Sicard, Vautrain, Vacherot, Bonvalet, Méline, Tolain, Milliere, and others, who tried to intervene in the name of the mayors, the formidable words,“ There is no discussion, no treating with murderers.”

The Central Committee, up to that time wavering, gave orders that Paris should be invaded and occupied. At the Hotel de Ville M. Jules Ferry still held out. He received repeated orders to evacuate. At 9.55 P.M. he left the Hotel de Ville, the last man to do so, carrying away his papers, and taking the servants with him. He crossed the center of Paris, already in the hands of the insurgents, escorted by the troops of General Derroja, who forced their way with fixed bayonets.

More information here and here, and below.

We want to take this site to the next level but we need money to do that. Please contribute directly by signing up at https://www.patreon.com/history